


The Storm

by orphan_account



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Carlos is a Dork, Carlos is a Good Boyfriend, Cecil Might be Human or Inhuman, Fluff, M/M, Prompt Fill, Science and Sciency Facts, Thunderstorms, Vague Night Vale Happenings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-21
Updated: 2014-01-21
Packaged: 2018-01-09 12:02:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1145748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cecil is freaked out by thunderstorms. Carlos helps him through it. Fluff and science geeks ensue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Storm

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for an anon on the kink meme. I'm sorry I'm so late in filling it, but I wanted to write my very first Cecilos and I had to find a good prompt. :) Here's the prompt: http://nightvalekink.livejournal.com/553.html?thread=28457#t28457
> 
> ALSO, if anyone has some Cecilos prompts (preferably some majorly fluffy stuffs), here's my tumblr: http://loveyouheichou.tumblr.com/
> 
> Enjoy~

Thunder is not commonplace in Night Vale, Carlos soon learns, and especially not at three-thirty in the morning. He is awoken by a blast of thunder that shakes the panes of his windows, almost simultaneously accompanied by the loud ringing of his phone just moments later. Groaning, the scientist fumbles for the small square of light in the otherwise pitch black room that signifies his cell’s location. The screen declares “Cecil” in too-bright, blocky letters, and he sighs through his nose, falling back onto his pillows and rubbing his forehead as he answers.

“Yes, Cecil?”

“Carlos,” comes the radio host’s voice, choked with sobs. He sniffles to partially compose himself before he cries on, words barely coherent to Carlos’s sleep-muddled brain. “It’s come back, it’s come back! Oh, sweet lovely Carlos, you must use your science to make it go away before it does it again!”

Carlos can feel a headache forming slowly, throbbing within his skull. “Make what go away, Cecil? It’s,” he glances to his bedside clock, glowing green in the dark, “three-thirty in the morning.”

The babble Cecil produces as an answer does nothing to answer his inquiries, and, sighing, Carlos gives up.

“I’ll be over in a few minutes,” he grumbles, ignoring his boyfriend’s exclamations of praise that follow. 

It is a short drive, given that he takes the right direction (if he went any other way, Cecil had previously assured him, he would simply drive forever and ever past the same houses without ever moving at all). It appears that many things do happen in Night Vale at three-thirty in the morning, as time is relevant, and there are people who need to get their grocery shopping done before the four A.M. rush. 

When Carlos knocks on Cecil’s door, it opens immediately, and he’s pulled inside so quickly that his hair is almost caught in the door when Cecil slams it shut immediately after. There are seven locks on the door, and it doesn’t take long for the trembling blonde to fasten them all back up and then launch himself at Carlos.

“Oh, Carlos, it’s simply dreadful,” he whimpers, nose burying itself in Carlos’s thick, swarthy hair. “It’s come back for us again!”

“What are you talking about, Cecil?” Carlos asks. Now that he’s more awake, he feels sympathetic, watching his lover’s red, wet eyes beneath his glasses. The jittery radio host steps back, giving him the You are an honorary citizen of Night Vale and you are entirely oblivious to the way things work around here look. Carlos shrugs innocently.

“It’s the Storm,” Cecil hisses in a whisper, as if mentioning it will make it worse, and a convenient blast of thunder makes him screech and jump back into Carlos’s arms again.  
“The Storm?” Carlos repeats. He glances to the windows, over which Cecil has tightly closed and slid shut the blinds, curtains, and municipally-approved iron chains. “Oh, I see. You’re afraid of thunderstorms.”

“Sssssshhhhhh!” Cecil clamps his hands over Carlos’s mouth, whimpering. The thunder booms and crackles outside. He tightens his hold on him. “No, Carlos, you don’t understand. This is no common thunderstorm- oh, no, this is the Storm.”

“The Storm,” Carlos says again.

“SSSHHHHH! It gets terribly angry when you speak about it for too long,” Cecil insists. “The last time the Storm was in town, it demanded sacrifice.”

“Many things demand sacrifice in Night Vale,” Carlos reminds him.

“Not that sort of sacrifice,” Cecil responds in his Don’t you know anything about Night Vale voice. “A mass sacrifice.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand, Cecil,” Carlos says apologetically. The tiredness is beginning to seep in again. He wants to sleep.

“Oh, Carlos, it was horrid. I had nightmares. Of mountains.”

“Of mountains.”

“Yes, Carlos. They were real and it was horrible.” The thunder seems to crash even louder outside. Cecil clings to him like a scared child, shoulders shaking, and Carlos sighs, running a hand through his hair. He slowly gathers the Voice of Night Vale into his arms and lugs him over to the couch (the one without teeth, which he prefers) and sinks onto the cushion, cradling Cecil close to him. 

Comforting people has never been Carlos’s strong spot- in fact, social convention at all is still a huge source of confusion to him. And yet here he is, cuddling his boyfriend close, brushing his lips slowly over his temple and kissing his hairline tenderly. He’s not sure what to say to him, so he comforts him the only way he knows how: through science.

“Thunder is caused by lightning,” he murmurs into his ear, his low, oaky voice seeping deep into his system and making his chest and belly feel warm. Cecil slowly finds himself calming in spite of the occasional cringe from thunder. He runs his hands over Carlos’s strong arms as they hold him in place, giving soft, airy giggles as his stubble brushes Cecil’s cheek. “The intense heat from lightning causes the surrounding air to rapidly expand and create a sonic wave that you hear as thunder,” Carlos explains, attempting to demystify the horrible Storm that Cecil was so frightened of. “Thousands of years ago, philosophers such as Aristotle believed that thunder was caused by the collision of clouds. The speed of sound is around 767 miles per hour, and the speed of light is around 669,600,000 miles per hour. Therefore, light travels faster than sound, and that’s why we see lightning before we hear thunder. A lightning bolt is, on average, four miles long, though abnormalities have been observed…” 

He continues to murmur all that he knows about thunder, lightning, and the two combined, and Cecil soaks it all in, slowly growing heavier in his arms, occasionally piping up to ask a question concerning his explanation. Soon, the questions and jitters and jerks stop, and Carlos looks down to see Cecil asleep in his arms, cuddled up to his chest. He can’t help but smile, kissing his forehead softly, and he gets to his feet to tuck Cecil into bed, taking care that the strange creature beneath didn’t snag at his covers again. The radio host smiles in his sleep, curls up around his pillow, and murmurs a breathy “Carlos” before falling quiet again. Carlos can’t help but smile himself and checks his watch to find that it’s more or less five in the morning. Hoping to find some coffee to perk himself up, he heads back to Cecil’s kitchen and attempts to tame the coffee maker, which tends to nibble at the fingers if provoked. The Storm, for the moment, has stopped.

When his coffee is done, Carlos takes a slow sip, creeps to the window and undoes the locks and blinds and curtains, peering down into the street.

When his eyes fall upon the dusty street outside of Cecil’s window, he spits out his coffee and claps a hand to his mouth in pure horror.

The Storm has struck again.


End file.
